


wait a minute, wait a minute (we're starting up a brand new day)

by congratsyouvegrownasoul



Series: time goes by; it's the time of your life [2]
Category: The Borgias (2011)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Female Friendship, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Rodrigo doesn't like drama but here he is surrounded by it, and it's his own damn fault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-21
Updated: 2014-10-21
Packaged: 2018-02-21 08:08:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2461016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/congratsyouvegrownasoul/pseuds/congratsyouvegrownasoul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"We did get some things right, didn't we?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	wait a minute, wait a minute (we're starting up a brand new day)

 

 

_**You're the church and I'm the preacher.** _

 

* * *

 

“I love you,” he says, all of a sudden, quiet as a prayer, half confession, half ecstasy.

He must feel it’s the perfect time for this new revelation. After all, they couldn’t be more close, lying next to each other, bare skin to bare skin, both still breathing hard. In between breaths, he’s kissing her hair where it lies against her neck, and between kisses--that’s when he says it.

He loves her.

It is not entirely unexpected, really. Giulia has seen him looking at her lately with something more tender than lust and more vulnerable than affection. In the moment, though, all her careful plans fly out of her head and she’s left tongue-tied and confused.

They’ve lain together like this many times in the last six months, so why tonight? It certainly didn’t feel routine, but it felt natural. Normal. Even safe, if sleeping with a technically-still-married man old enough to be her father could ever be considered a safe choice. But something about tonight had apparently struck Rodrigo as different, special, enough to spur this.

He loves her.

There is a difference, she knows, between a lover and the one you love, but she can’t quite grasp it. An imperceptible gap, always barely evading her, a gap she does not quite understand and can’t quite cross. There are perhaps too many words for love and lust, and yet there are so many intricacies of intimacy.

Rodrigo is not her boyfriend--that is too juvenile, a title for a man her own age who eats cheap Chinese with her at the kitchen table and considers getting a cat the highest level of commitment he’s ready for. Of course, Rodrigo’s commitments are more to work and home and family than they are to her, but it’s good to know he’s capable. She is perfectly content to live with what he has to offer.

He takes her to dinner, and to the theater, and afterwards they argue about antiheroes and whether the set actually resembled a Paris opera house at all. They sit on the roof of her building under the stars with a pastry-box of cannoli and a bottle of expensive wine and talk about constellations, mythology, gods and God. And, of course, they make love, they fuck, they have sex.

It is good enough, even if she sometimes feels faintly guilty about his wife. Even if she had to stop talking about her relationship to her friends, all of them perfect, professional, progressive women, just like her, she had thought.

_Don’t you feel a little bit like a, you know...homewrecker?_

_Are you doing this for attention, like when you dated girls in college?_

_Aren’t you concerned he’s just interested in your looks?_

_You don’t actually need a man anymore, you know. _

It is good enough. Until he starts talking of love, and then suddenly everything flips upside down and the smallest things are of paramount importance.

He loves her, now. Rodrigo Borgia says he loves her.

Does she love him?

Giulia wants him, certainly, his kisses and passion and strange gentleness. And she likes him, bright-eyed charisma and stream-of-consciousness chatter and the silences when he pulls away and just watches. Does she love him, though? God and grandeur and desperation and all, perhaps she could.

He kisses her hair, and in between kisses he says he loves her. She is painfully conscious of the way her heart beats, rushing blood yet faster as she ponders the fatal choice, to please or to deny. She rolls over, her breasts nestling against the blunt edges where his ribs curl together, and feels his heartbeat jar with hers. His eyes are wide and dark and full of hope, full of doubt.

“I love you too,” she says, and if it’s not entirely the truth, it could be.

She may not need him, not in this world where she is young and independent, but it is so very nice to be needed.

* * *

**How many lonely, sleepless nights?**

_The river's wide, we'll swim across_

**How many lies, how many fights?**

_We're starting up a brand new day_

**And why would you want to put yourself through all that again?**

 

* * *

“Mom? Can you help me with a project?”

The voice is Lucrezia’s, and her knock on the study door is insistent.

“Sure, honey, come in,” Vannozza calls, glad for an excuse to briefly abandon paperwork and taxes.

Lucrezia clutches a sheaf of glossy magazine cutouts, held together with a massive binder clip. Not an essay, then.

“Art project?”

“No, it’s actually not something for school. Not really, anyway.” Lucrezia smiles sheepishly. “It’s kind of silly, I guess. It’s for homecoming--I want to look really nice, it’s my first formal dance with a date and I kinda want to impress Paolo and...”

She leaves the sentence unfinished, looking up hopefully.

"I was wondering if you could help me with my hair?"

Vannozza laughs, getting up from her chair.

“That’s not silly. Unless you’ve got some bizarre idea of what ‘impressive’ looks like, of course. I may have devoted an unnecessary amount of time and money to hairspray and home perms when I was fifteen, but I can counsel you otherwise.”

Lucrezia grins. “Yeah, '80s Jersey girl is not the look I’m going for.” She holds out the packet of clippings for approval.

Vannozza flips through the pages, raising her eyebrows slightly in surprise. The look Lucrezia’s going for seems to be some kind of ultra-romantic, structurally-complex Milanese-high-fashion vibe, going by the elaborate-updo-sporting runway models she’s cut out pictures of.

Vannozza chooses her words carefully.

“Lucrezia, don’t you think this is a little over-the-top for a high school dance?”

She is just this side of disturbed, honestly. With Cesare newly off at college and Juan seemingly unable to be discouraged from embarking on a career as a frat boy before he even graduates high school, Vannozza is perhaps over-eager to keep her daughter from growing up too fast.  Lucrezia might be dedicated and ambitious about her schoolwork and her dancing, but she’s not the worldly sophisticate these pictures hint at, although many of the models aren’t much older. She has her first boyfriend, certainly, but Paolo seems more like a smitten puppy than a serious suitor.

Lucrezia shrugs.

“I’m not going to put a Byzantine crown on my head like in the Valentino picture, Mom. It’s meant for inspiration. I want to have braids and a twist in back with maybe some gold costume thread in there. I’ll have to straighten my hair first, of course.”

Vannozza is still not entirely comfortable with this idea.

“You looked lovely at your quinceanera, honey. And it played up your curls, too. I think I could adapt something from the photos, and I’ll call your aunt and ask for advice if I have to. How would you feel about a more understated version of that?”

The idea of phoning in for help from Rodrigo’s sister is somewhat daunting. She’s never felt entirely accepted by Rodrigo’s family, ever since she first met them. Everyone had crowded around,  fussing over baby Cesare and repeatedly asking Rodrigo when the wedding was. Some elderly great-aunt called her a _puta_ in an undertone and nobody seemed to realize that the Italian Jersey girl had four years of high school Spanish, or that it takes two people to make a baby. She had given the older woman a glacial smile,  and politely but adamantly taken her son back. Rodrigo had wrapped a protective arm around her waist and whispered apologies in her ear, but she’d felt the sting of that for years.

The quinceanera had been a nightmare, really.

Lucrezia had looked forward to her coming-of-age party since she was a little girl, sighing over her older cousins’ frilly dresses and fanciful hairstyles, piped-frosting roses on cakes and glossy fresh-waxed dance floors.  This love of pageantry was inherited from her father; Vannozza had never cherished idealistic girlhood dreams of wedding ceremonies or the perfect prom night, although she could plan and execute an event as skillfully as anyone, and usually enjoyed parties well enough.

The party itself went off without a hitch, and Lucrezia looked like a princess, paraded into adulthood on her proud father’s arm, but the whole spectacle felt hollow. Despite her talents, she had had no part in the planning--it was all Lucrezia’s father’s family. Vannozza needn’t worry about a single detail, Rodrigo had promised. He would make everything absolutely perfect. He’d fussed over it for months, fixing all the details with his relatives beforehand, sending money and instructions cross-country while his mother and siblings booked the venue, the bakery, the dressmaker. The date was set for early June, a few months after Lucrezia’s actual birthday, as soon as school was over and they could fly west.

Just weeks before, she found out about Giulia Farnese. Compared to that, the long-expected party seemed both anticlimactic and like a harbinger of their family’s impending doom.

They weren’t going to tell Rodrigo’s family--they’d probably find a way to blame her for this, Vannozza had thought bitterly. The children knew about separate bedrooms and tension, but the bits and pieces of the timeline hadn’t quite fallen together; they hadn’t yet guessed their father’s dirty little open secret. There was no long-term plan, not yet. The wreckage was unsalvaged, possibly unsalvageable.

It was not her party, not her culture, and by this point it didn’t even feel like her life anymore. But it was her daughter’s day, even if it was not hers, and Lucrezia was radiant as always. Rodrigo seemed to be beaming at everyone except her, practically bursting with energy. She’s known him long enough, more than well enough to see he was overcompensating. Rodrigo likes everything running smoothly, everyone happy and cared for, and can’t stand to think his actions might take away from that. Always, he patches over the wounds he’s caused; always, he apologizes. It might be selfless if it didn’t seem so fucking selfish.

He did, finally, approach her, retreating from the dance floor and slipping into the chair next to hers. She shifted aside, away, turning her back on him even as she made room.

Rodrigo leaned on the table, balanced precariously on his elbows, cocking his head at her.

"I could ask you to dance."

Cesare had danced with her earlier, playing the graceful gentleman very well, if a little stiffly, and probably prodded his brothers to do the same. Joffre had stepped on her toes and chattered, and Juan, inexplicably, had flecks of frosting on the tip of his nose. She'd taken the hands of all three of her boys in turn, and, smiling, coached Joffre to be lighter on his feet, Cesare to loosen up, and Juan to wipe his nose, for the love of God.

"You could."

Rodrigo has always been an exuberant, joyful dancer. They used to wear each other out and then drift in peaceable silence, her head against his shoulder.

"Would you say yes?"

She bit her lip, avoiding his eyes.

"I don't know. I don't think so."

He sighed, pushed up on his elbows away from the table, leaned back in his chair.

"Fair enough. We'll be wallflowers, then. Watch the party."

"I don't think you'll make a very good wallflower."

But they watched, all the same.

Cesare was dancing with his sister, his movements finally fluid, twirling her in ever-more-dizzying circles. Lucrezia had her head thrown back, laughing at her reflection in the mirrored ceiling.

A pack of the cousins, all boys, were scuffling on the outskirts of the party, hyped up on sugar and ceremony. Joffre tackled Juan from behind, and instead of shaking off his smaller brother, Juan fell to the ground, dramatically yelping. The sight made Vannozza smile to herself.  Somehow, Juan is less childish when he acts like the boy he used to be, rather than posturing as some skewed idea of manhood.

She might have said as much to Rodrigo, but he's always viewed their children with starry eyes and a soft heart. She watched him, looking at the same scene, always seeing differently.

So she just smiled and said it the simplest way she could.

"We did get some things right, didn't we?"

Even if it's not entirely the truth, it could be.

So, tragedy or farce, the quinceanera hadn't been all for nothing. Nothing ever was.

Now, though, Lucrezia scrunches up her face in embarrassment at the memory.

“Mom, I don’t want to have quinceanera hair at this dance. It’s...I was so pretty, but Disney-princess pretty, like I was playing dress-up. Girls at school don’t want to look like princesses, they want to look like high fashion. No one I know in Washington had a quinceanera.”

Vannozza resists the urge to tell her that the glitz and glamour she craves is possibly even more of a costume. Still, now the real issue is out in the open.

“Are you trying to impress Paolo, or the girls at school?”

“Both?”

Vannozza sighs.

“Honey, you could turn up in your pajamas and Paolo would look at you like you’d stepped out of a painting, trust me. As for the rest of the girls at school...pajamas or runway model, judgmental people will always judge you for something. You’re smart, and talented, and beautiful, and very tough, and if that’s not impressive enough, they’re a bunch of silly, snotty prep school girls and they don’t deserve you, okay?”

Lucrezia leans into her hug, smiling, relieved, resigned.

“Thanks, Mom. But...even if they’re a bunch of silly, snotty prep school girls, I’m still spending the next three years of my life with them.”

If her daughter needs to play dress-up to feel like she’s in armor, Vannozza will make sure she gets the costume she needs. Even if it means allying herself with people much more intimidating than Rodrigo’s sister.

“Lucrezia, your hair looked beautiful when you danced at the charity gala last spring. It was very elegant, and you still had your curls. I’m not great with elaborate hairstyles and I don’t know much about high fashion or prep-school girls, but I think if you had Giulia come over and try out some of the stuff from the photos, or even just do what she did for the gala again, I’ll able to pick up enough to do your hair for the dance.”

Lucrezia pulls back in surprise, and some trepidation.

“Is that...okay?”

“You need her help, and I want you to get what you need.”

Besides, it only takes one person to break up a marriage, and she doesn’t want to become a judgmental old woman whispering _whore_ under her breath.

 

* * *

 

 

**"Love is pain," I hear you say**

_Stand up, all you lovers in the world_

**Love has a cruel and bitter way**

_We're starting up a brand new day_

**Of paying you back for all the faith you ever had**

 

* * *

 

Giulia twists her key in the ignition, the soft hum of her car engine clicking to a stop. The radio shuts off with it, bringing a chorus of violins to an abrupt halt mid-swell. The only sound is her breathing, coming in nervous huffs. She tells herself she’s being silly, forces herself into yoga breaths, imagines calm suffusing into her body alongside the oxygen. This doesn’t really work; there is an obnoxiously logical voice in the back of her mind telling her that calm is not a tangible substance, and therefore illusive.

She’s an adult, she tells herself. If she’s made her bed--unmade someone else’s marital bed in the process--she can certainly lay in it. Besides, it was Vannozza’s idea. Lucrezia had assured her it would be fine.

“You’re not helping with my hair because you’re my dad’s girlfriend,” Lucrezia had insisted stubbornly. “You’re doing it because you’re my friend. And you were my friend first, anyway.”

Giulia had had to laugh at that, if only because the stalwart possessiveness of the statement had reminded her of Lucrezia’s youth, and the bizarre circumstances of their...well, yes, she supposed it was a friendship.

She had never been able to picture herself as a mother; she’s always found small children grating, and the idea of being entirely responsible for someone else’s life was terrifying. Lucrezia, of course, is not her child, and barely a child at that. She’s at that in-between stage where she’s almost a woman, a stage which Giulia remembers all too well. Anyone at that age could use guidance, and Giulia’s happy to help, but the closeness in their ages makes the gap between mentor and friend much narrower.

She hadn’t expected to connect so much with the youngest dancer in her gala troupe. Giulia had pictured a shy, preppy freshman who would focus entirely on mastering the choreography she handed down. Instead, she had Lucrezia, golden, talented, cheery Lucrezia, who was as graceful dancing as she was boisterous otherwise. Giulia was charmed, and impressed. Such drive and personality at the eternally awkward age of fourteen surely indicated a bright future.

She can see herself in Lucrezia, although more exuberant, less calculating, differences not explained away by age. Meeting her new friend’s father had complicated matters, but it had also, eventually, brought her into Lucrezia’s life on a more permanent basis.

On the other hand, she had tried not to upset Vannozza’s life anymore than she already had. By mutual, unspoken agreement, they’d mostly avoided each other over the summer. Even though Giulia and Rodrigo’s affair was out in the open now, and she’d begun visiting their house semi-regularly, they managed to never be in the same room for longer than a minute or so. Giulia wasn’t driving Vannozza out of her own house by any means--usually she went out alone with Rodrigo if they wanted each other’s company, and she’d never stayed the night with him, although he’d slept at her apartment. But sometimes he wanted time with both her and his family, and there she was, and there Vannozza, apparently, didn’t want to be.

The first time she’d met Vannozza was after the gala’s opening night. She’d been changing out of her costume, and seen Lucrezia bounding across the crowded dressing room, holding her father’s hand, with a woman close behind. Giulia hadn’t recognized her, but could easily guess at her identity.  She’d hastily pulled on yoga pants over her leotard. Odd modesty, perhaps, covering up her bare legs for a man who’d already seen her completely naked on several occasions.

When the three of them reached her, Rodrigo hung back, glancing at his feet.

“Mom, this is Giulia. She designed pretty much everything but the costumes.”

Vannozza had given her a friendly, open smile, which Giulia tried her best to return.

“I’ve heard a lot about you. The piece was beautiful. You certainly did a wonderful job.”

“So did Lucrezia--she’s very talented.”

The pleasantries were formulaic, if true. Lucrezia beamed at the praise, then turned to Rodrigo.

“Dad, you met Giulia when you came to pick me up that one time, remember? You guys talked for a while when I was getting my costume fitted?”

The expression of profound discomfort on Rodrigo’s face might actually have been laughable if the situation hadn’t been so awkward for her as well.

“I do remember. Um, good to see you again.”

He shook her hand, the gesture bizarrely formal. His fingers did not linger on hers.

It was surprising, actually, how poorly he was dealing with the situation. Charming, confident Rodrigo, all his flirtation and political doublespeak seemingly up in smoke. Granted, a conversation with his wife, secret lover, and teenage daughter would seem a most dangerous trap. Still, you would think a man embarking on an extramarital affair would have a better contingency plan. Giulia wondered whether it was guilt or just the fear of being caught that set him off-balance.

Vannozza kept glancing at her husband, expression slowly turning from confusion into slight suspicion. Rodrigo, thankfully, finally had the good sense to focus his attention on the person present with whom he had the least fraught relationship.

“Lucrezia, did you get your present?”

Lucrezia grinned. “You didn’t have to buy out the florist, Dad.”

Before the performance, she’d gotten a delivery, an overflowing armful of trumpet-shaped, satiny white lilies and little pink tea roses. Giulia had flowers too, a simple corsage of yellow orchids. The card was blank, but the wrappings were the same delicate white paper as Lucrezia’s. It was a sweet gesture, one she hadn’t expected.

Lucrezia, giddy with excitement, charged off to show them backstage. Rodrigo followed hastily, doubtless feeling as if he’d been saved. Giulia would have been happy to stay behind, but Vannozza gestured as if she wanted company, and she couldn’t politely refuse.

“Lucrezia has been just ecstatic about the gala--it’s her first semi-professional performance, and she absolutely adores you.”

“Thank you. I adore Lucrezia; she’s a delightful young lady. I’d love to work with her again.”

“Lucrezia says you’re an architect? I’m amazed you find time to work full-time and do amateur performances.”

“It’s not too difficult if you love what you do.”

Vannozza pursed her lips.

“I suppose.”

She turned to look at Giulia, her gaze direct and searching.

“You must have made quite an impression on my husband when you met him. He’s usually quite social, especially with pretty women.”

Giulia’s stomach lurched.

“I can be very intimidating,” she said, trying to keep her tone joking.

Vannozza turned away from her, walking faster upstairs, towards the stage.

“I suppose you can.”

The memory does not do anything to assuage Giulia’s anxieties.

It is much more difficult to relate to Vannozza than to Lucrezia. Lucrezia is in a different stage of life, but parallel. Giulia cannot imagine herself ever being in the same place as Vannozza. After all, she’d never been able to picture herself as a mother.

Not that there aren’t things about Vannozza that she admires, of course. The older woman has a sort of vibrant elegance about her, and a deep-rooted pride so subtle Giulia could have almost missed it. But Giulia wants better for herself than long-suffering love and duty.

And yet, here she is, on a Saturday afternoon, swallowing her own pride and ringing the doorbell. And what motivates her, but love and duty?  Or, at the very least, affection and a strange sense of righteousness. Here she is, making reparations, atoning for sins, even if they’re not her own.

She hopes Lucrezia will answer the door, and vaguely dreads having to confront Vannozza right off the bat. The door, however, swings open to reveal Juan, wearing pajama trousers and a basketball jersey.

He grins expansively.

“Hi, Giulia.”

Lucrezia is not nearly so fond of Rodrigo’s sons as she is of his daughter. Cesare, the eldest, is doleful and suspicious. Juan is the sort of high school boy she hoped to never interact with again: obnoxious and clumsily forward. Joffre is inoffensive but still a child.

“Hello,” she says. “Where are your mom and Lucrezia?”

Juan jerks a thumb over his shoulder at the stairs.

“Up in Lucrezia’s bedroom. Hey, Giulia, try not to get into it with my mom, okay? I just woke up and I don’t want to have to throw water over the two of you to cool you down. Although there’d certainly be benefits…”

He’s looking at her chest, of course, imagining her pale blue t-shirt soaked. The innuendo is painfully obvious, and she winces.

“Juan, don’t be disgusting. It’s extremely unappealing.”

“Besides,” she calls as she heads for the stairs,  “Don’t you think I’m a little too old for you?”

Behind her, Juan rolls his eyes.

“Don’t you think my dad’s a little too old for you?”

There’s no bite behind the comment; he’s just throwing her words back in her face. She squares her shoulders and heads for the second floor.

Lucrezia is sitting cross-legged on her bed, hair falling down her back in a golden shower. Vannozza, next to her, wields a bristling hairbrush, smoothing out tangles and leaving the loose curls.

“Giulia!” Lucrezia smiles, twitching her hand in greeting.

“Testing out the royal wave?”

Her quip is rewarded with a laugh.

“Okay, you get a real wave. How’s that?”

“Better.”

“I didn’t want to be too enthusiastic and get my hair pulled.”

“I’m trying to be gentle,” Vannozza protests.

“I’d hate to see you otherwise,” Lucrezia shudders in mock horror.

“Hello, Vannozza,” Giulia says shyly.

Vannozza looks up. Her eyes have dark circles under them, as if she hasn’t been sleeping very well, and faint laugh-lines spreading out from the corners. Her face is calm and collected, but it is almost as if she is looking past Giulia, seeing something else. She blinks, and she sees Giulia, and the calm of her face cracks momentarily.

She is scared too, Giulia realizes. The thought is both reassuring and saddening.

“Thank you for inviting me,” she says quietly. “What can I do to help?”

The crack in Vannozza’s facade is gone, not boarded over but vanished entirely. The mask itself comes crumbling down, defeated by a small, sincere smile.

“Do you know how to do a psyche knot? I can’t quite figure it out.”

 

* * *

 

**_I'm the answer to your question_ **

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Title and bookend quotes are from "Brand New Day" by Sting.
> 
> This chapter went through several different incarnations before I settled on this particular series of vignettes. Some of the deleted scenes--Cesare at college, Lucrezia and Paolo at the dance, Sforzas Gone Wild--may make appearances in future installments. 
> 
> As for this chapter's format itself: I wanted to write the intersections and dynamics of the two pairings involving Rodrigo, but also focus on female interactions and especially building up positive female interactions. However, there's a bit of rockiness to get through before these three flawless ladies can all be my ultimate dream team, and I'm a little insecure about whether I portrayed their conflicts accurately without pitting them against each other, because canon does a very good job of the Vannozza/Giulia interactions and I don't want to step in the wrong direction.
> 
> Another thing: I'm a little nervous about how I write Rodrigo because he is a personal favorite, and yet I must not woobify him and, especially given the exact time this story is set, highlight his tendency towards jerkiness. So I'm very conflicted about my portrayal of him? Do I give him too much sympathy? Do I exaggerate his neediness? Dear readers, please enlighten me, for I too am, tragically, needy.


End file.
